


The Nuclear Option

by RedGold



Category: Timeless (TV 2016)
Genre: Fix-It, Gen, Jessica deserved better, can be whatever pairing you want, fate doesn't work that way, resetting the board, technically no pairing, we all deserved better, we make our own choices
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-01
Updated: 2019-01-01
Packaged: 2019-10-01 23:01:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,036
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17253020
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RedGold/pseuds/RedGold
Summary: “Sometimes… sometimes change happens because a thousand voices cry out and make themselves heard, many moving parts of some Rube-Goldberg Machine. But… from time to time… it just takes one person, making one decision, and that changes the fate of the world.”“And you’re that person?”“No, I didn’t make this decision alone."





	The Nuclear Option

**The Nuclear Option**

They were there, when Lucy Preston’s car had skidded off the road into the lake. The good samaritan was nowhere to be found, waylaid by agents. So one of them dived in and pulled Lucy from the depths. They left her on the side of the road, her tears covered by the rain, as emergency services approached. Lucy was never going to let herself be put in that position ever again.

They were there, when Connor Mason learned of this bright and talented student: Rufus Carlin. They found the agent tasked with intercepting their correspondence, destroying the relationship before it even began, and then quietly took them out. And the other agent, the one who tried to stop Mason from getting on the plane to go visit Rufus and support him, things did not end well for him either. 

They were there, when Flynn and Stiv were given orders to run security detail for some military engineers looking to scout for a new road. Someone had swapped out Flynn’s orders, telling him to stand down, so they swapped them back. The mix up caused a small delay, and when Flynn showed up, the engineers were already packed, ready to go. The lead engineer, Lorena, was not impressed, just told him the terrain was going to be rough and she hoped he could ride a horse.

They were there, when Wyatt stood outside the Army recruitment office and asked himself if this was his ticket out of the life his father gave him? Could he be a good soldier, a good man, like his grandpa? He didn’t even hear the commotion in the alley behind the building. They had found the agent who was to keep Wyatt from going in, and his blood would stain the concrete for days. 

They were there, they were always there, and they were tired…

The Lifeboat appeared in the abandoned warehouse they were holed up in. Amaranthe was the first to stick her head out, to make sure nothing had changed. That everything stayed the same.

“Another successful mission, Mara?” Amy Logan asked from where she sat a ratty desk, papers and books stacked in piles, casting shadows in the dim light. She was only just thirty, but she carried the weight of someone who had seen far too much for so few years.

“Yeah, sure.” Mara took heavy steps down the ladder, her long, light brown hair bouncing in a ponytail. “If telling a bunch of Rittenhouse goons that, yes, your orders to murder a five-year-old girl in cold blood still stand, so off you go, you happy little sociopaths… sorry, I was going somewhere with that.”

“Nothing changed,” Deek said as he followed Mara down the steps, his own gait weary. “Lorena and Iris died, Flynn fled straight to Stiv.”

“Yay, success,” Mara said with a level of enthusiasm that… wasn’t.

“It’s unfortunate,” Amy sighed as she closed the journal she was reading, “but if Flynn doesn’t steal the Mothership—”

“Then Rittenhouse gets it unimpeded,” Mara finished the party-line as she dragged her feet to their broken sofa. “’Had to happen,’ ‘protect the timeline,’ ‘destiny,’ ‘fate,’ ‘same old shit.’ Allow me a minute to be pissed about aiding in the death of an innocent child as I lay here and bleed out.”

Mara collapsed back onto the sofa with a thunk.

Ji-yoo sat on the armrest and stared down at her. “Did you get stabbed again?”

“I dunno, probably.” Mara ran her hands over her face.

“There was no stabbing, this time,” Deek informed them as he went over to the battered fridge. 

The fridge had several dents and deep scratches in it from being moved around. An entire chunk of aluminum had been cut from the door when they needed an emergency patch. But it still looked better than the motley crew that gathered in the warehouse. There was a dozen of them, all told, not a single one older than thirty-five, and all carrying at least one nasty scar.

Amy glanced across her mother’s journals, and all the secrets within. 

“Where do you think they’ll try next?” Harrison asked as he looked up from the computers situated off to the side. It was his shift to keep an eye out for other time jumps. The rest of their group sleeping until their own shifts.

“I’m thinking they’re going to go farther back,” Ji-yoo commented, still sitting on the armrest. “It’s a bit riskier to completely erase someone from the timeline, but any disruption in the Time Team dynamics would probably serve in their favor.”

There was silent agreement, this was never going to end as long as there were turning points in history that could be upended.

It took a good five minutes before Amy could get the words out. “There is always the Nuclear Option.”

“Yeah, no, our government’s been there, done that,” Mara groused, still sprawled on the sofa. “That’s how we lost Oklahoma, and irradiated the rest of the Mid-West and Farm Belt.”

“Is Oklahoma in the Mid-West?” Ji-yoo asked.

“Yes, of course it is.” Mara looked up at her. “It’s in the middle, and west.”

“But it mostly sets below the Mason-Dixon Line,” Ji-yoo pointed out. 

“I am not getting into a geographical debate with you right now,” she replied with a mix of fondness and exhaustion.

“I didn’t mean a literal nuke,” Amy interrupted them. “I meant _your_ Nuclear Option.”

The room went quiet, Mara’s eyes snapping towards Amy. “You know I was drunk on bathtub vodka when I came up with that, right?”

“Doesn’t make your plan any less valid,” Amy replied firmly.

Deeks raised his hand. “You realize the Nuclear Option has the potential of erasing everyone in this building?”

“Including you, Amy.” Mara sat up on the sofa.

“I am very well aware,” Amy sighed and stood. “We risk our lives every hour of every day. How many of us have died in this war already? My sister…” Amy cleared her throat. “My mother once said, the future isn’t perfect, but it’s ours. Well, if it’s ours, then I think we have the right to demand a refund.”

“Now you sound like your father,” Harrison said dryly, but no one could doubt the validity of her words.

“If he were alive, I think he’d agree that the risk is worth the reward.” Amy picked up one of her mother’s journals. “All it would take is one nudge, one change, and the six billion lives that have been lost in the past ten years would be saved. I am more than willing to risk my own life to make that happen.”

“ _Could_ be saved.” Mara made that clear. “All it does it reset the board, there is no way to know what will happen next.”

“True.” Ji-yoo put her hand on Mara’s shoulder. “But that was the beauty of your plan, as alcohol induced as it was. Not too early, not to late. It allows for the maximum Time Team resources before the Leviathan is built.”

Amy looked Mara straight in the eyes. “You weren’t that drunk. You’re just afraid that you were right.”

Mara couldn’t hold her gaze, instead stared down at the ground. Quiet settled across them, everyone taking in what was just said. Could they do this? Could they enact the Nuclear Option?

“No one person can make this decision,” Amy finally said. “Wake up the others. We’ll settle this like the Greeks.”

Two hours later, the other half of the team was gathered. Everyone knew of the plan, had all thought about it from time to time since it was first mentioned. No one dared to bring it back up again, not until Amy did. She had so much to lose if they went through with it. But not as much as Mara.

“Take a green one and a red one,” Amy said as she passed around a tray that had painted bolts sitting on it. When they had all done so, she grabbed a bucket scrounged from a dark corner and held it up. “Green, we enact the Nuclear Option, risk our very existence on a better future. Red, we continue on, fighting the fight, trying to find another way to end this.”

Amy was the first to cast her vote, then she walked around the members gathered, bucket held high so no one could see what was inside. Each person placed their hand in it, letting their vote drop with a dull thud that turned into sharp clangs as more and more bolts were added. Mara was the last. The two women stared at each other with infinite sadness.

Mara tossed her vote into the bucket quickly, ripping off the band-aid as it were.

There was no dining room, just a tall, large wooden bench that had been there when they moved in. Amy walked over to it and in full view of everyone, turned the bucket upside, the bolts clattering out.

Nothing but green.

There is a liminal space between relief and fear. 

“So,” Deeks cleared his throat. “Who’s going to do it?”

“I will,” Mara said as if it had already been decided. “It was my plan, and… and I’m the only one who doesn’t stand a chance of making it through a reset alive.”

~~~

February 11th, 2012

“Sorry, I’m late,” Carrie said as she pulled off her jacket, walking behind the bar.

“It’s okay,” Jess told her as she restocked beers into the cooler. “Wyatt isn’t here yet.”

“You two going to that new hot spot?” Carrie asked, putting away her things under the bar.

“Yeah,” Jess tried to put some enthusiasm in it. “Date night.”

“Have fun!” the woman moved away, towards the office to punch in for the evening shift. 

Wyatt was late, again, so Jess continued on doing her job, making sure Carrie and the other bartenders would have everything they needed for the night. She looked up and noticed one of her customers had finished their drink, scotch. 

Jess grabbed the bottle and walked over, “Need a refill?”

“No, but I’ll take one anyway,” the woman pulled a twenty out of her pocket and laid it on the bar as Jess poured her another drink.

The woman looked to be about the same age as Jess, a few years older, perhaps. She had pale white skin and long, straight brown hair pulled back into a ponytail which further confused her age. Jess probably should have carded her, just to be on the safe side, but there was far too much age in the woman’s eyes not to let her have a drink. Jess had seen her type, people who had been to war and back. 

“You a vet?” Jess asked softly. 

“Is it that frightfully obvious?” She downed the second drink in one go. 

“My husband’s a vet,” she replied, pouring another drink. “This one is on me, but water next.”

“Thanks.” The lady picked up the glass and swirled the liquid around. “He didn’t come back quite right, did he?”

Jess stalled for a second, then sighed. “Is it that frightfully obvious?”

“A bit.” She shrugged and down the scotch, clearly satisfied at the burn. “To be fair, PTSD and survivor’s guilt is a real bitch. But if Wyatt just talked about it instead of bottling it away, letting it boil over into bouts of paranoia and anger...”

“Yeah…” Jess wasn’t sure what to make of what the woman said. Obviously, she heard her talk about Wyatt to Carrie, but how did she know the rest so succinctly? 

“You know, there is one question I never could find the answer to.” She put her empty glass back on the napkin. “Did Rittenhouse push you towards Wyatt, or did you honestly fall in love with him this time as well?”

“What are you talking about?” Jess said, even as she calculated just how far away her phone was, sitting on the back counter. 

“Course you do.” There was an intensity to the woman’s eyes that stopped Jess in her mental tracks. “Carol Preston came to your family with a miracle, and the cost of it was your loyalty. I’m here to question that loyalty. Plain and simple.”

Well, there seemed like no point in denying anything in that moment. It would be better to get answers, something to take back to Rittenhouse after taking care of… “Who are you?”

“Amaranthe, but everyone calls me Mara.”

“Who do you work for?”

Mara paused, eyes unfocusing for a moment. “That’s a really good question, actually. I guess, right now, I work for myself.”

This Mara was being surprisingly helpful, which was suspicious, but Jess asked, “What do you want?”

“For you to get back in the car.”

That… was not the answer Jess was expecting, not even close.

“Tonight’s going to be a shitty night,” Mara said bluntly. “You’re going to run into an ex and Wyatt is going to get drunk and lose it. You’re going to argue, again, and you’ll do what you’ve been doing, extracting yourself before you say something you both regret. Because that’s the mission, right? Rittenhouse has a point to all this, you being a bartender with an emotionally damaged husband.”

“Don’t talk about Wyatt like that,” Jess defended him. “He—”

“Needs therapy, yeah, I know,” Mara waved her off. “He’s a good person underneath all that toxic crap his father and the war piled onto him. But tonight, he’s just an asshole.”

Mara spoke as if she knew… she _knew_ Wyatt, and Jess, and all their secrets. “How do you know all this?”

“Get back in the car, and I’ll tell you everything tomorrow.”

There was honk and Jess looked up to see Wyatt’s car outside.

Mara put a hundred dollar bill on the bar. “Leave the bottle before you go.”

~~~

February 12th, 2012

Everything happened the way Mara said it would, and as Jess stood in the road with Wyatt pleading for her to get back in, Jess’s insurmountable curiosity outweighed her anger at Wyatt. She got back in the car and made Wyatt sleep on the sofa.

The woman was sitting at the bar when Jess got in the next day for her shift. This time she looked to be nursing a beer, a long gaze that spoke of infinite loss. And when Jess came around the corner, and Mara glanced up to see her, there was such an honest expression of relief that Jess had to pause.

“You got back in the car,” Mara said when Jess finally approached.

“So, what did you do?” Jess crossed her arms, annoyed at being manipulated. “Did you trick my ex into being there or pay him off?”

“Neither, he was there of his own free will, just like you.”

“What kind of game are you playing?” 

“No game.” Mara shrugged. “I am here to question your loyalty and to manipulate you into making your own choices. I’m never not going to be honest with you.”

Jessica wasn’t sure just how much offense to take at that. “Then tell me how you knew what was going to happen last night.”

“The same way I know that Obama will be re-elected, Putin gets elected President of Russia, there will be a mass shooting in a movie theater in Colorado and another at an elementary school, and _nothing_ … will change.” Mara let out the sardonic laugh of someone who has gone past giving up. “And that’s just this year alone.”

“So, you’re a competitor to Rittenhouse,” Jess was disgusted at the thought of this woman making the shootings happen. “Manipulating events to try to change the world.”

“I suppose that’s true.” Mara nodded. “The thing is, unlike Rittenhouse, I’m not doing it for myself. In fact, it’s quite the opposite.”

Jess frowned. “That doesn’t make any sense.”

“It will, one day,” Mara promised her. “Until then, I want you to keep one thing in mind… choice.”

“Choice?”

Mara looked away, down the bar and out the window. “Sometimes… sometimes change happens because a thousand voices cry out and make themselves heard, many moving parts of some Rube-Goldberg Machine. But… from time to time… it just takes one person, making one decision, and that changes the fate of the world.”

“And you’re that person?”

“No,” Mara turned back and smiled at her. “No, I didn’t make this decision alone.”

“Hey,” Jess’ boss called lightly from the end of the bar. “You going to clock in or what?”

“Be right there,” Jess called back, not taking her eyes off of Mara. “You didn’t really answer my question.”

“I did, just not to your satisfaction.”

“Well, that’s pedantic.” Jess was not amused.

“I wanted you to get back in the car,” Mara said unapologetically. “I said I was manipulating you. Two and two makes four.”

“I should call my superiors,” Jess threatened her.

Mara smiled, grabbing a pen from farther down the counter, left on top of someone’s forgotten crossword puzzle. “You should, but you won’t.”

Jess crossed her arms again. “And why won’t I?” 

“Because you’re curious, and if you turn me in, you’ll for sure never get any answers,” she said as she wrote something on a clean napkin. “Here, research assignment.”

Mara slid the napkin across the bar, it held a very Eastern European sounding name. 

“Research assignment?” Jess frowned as she picked it up.

“I’ll be in touch.” Mara hopped off the barstool and straightened her jacket. “Oh, did you know it’s Abraham Lincoln’s birthday today?”

“Is that important?”

“No,” Mara chuckled. “Inside joke.”

Mara walked out of the bar leaving Jess holding the napkin with the name Stanislav Petrov written on it.

When Jess got a chance, she looked him up. He was a Soviet lieutenant colonel who made a decision to defy his direct orders, and in doing so single handedly saved the world from going to nuclear war in 1983. 

Why had Mara given her his name?

~~~

December 18th, 2014

“Bartender, scotch,” a voice said behind her and Jess paused, glancing up into the mirror.

“I was beginning to think you died or something,” Jess said as she grabbed the bottle and turned around. 

“Patience is a virtue, just ask a rock.” Mara slid onto the stool.

Jess took a clean glass from under the bar, sitting it in front of Mara. As she poured the drink, she asked, “You arrange those shootings?”

“No, but I suppose I could have stopped them.” There was far too much weight and pain in her words for them not to be true. “I guess that makes me negligent at the very least.”

Mara downed the first scotch and Jess poured another, then sat the bottle on the bar. “You want me to do something else? Maybe get on a bus or something?”

“You could change the tv channel to the news?” Mara shrugged, glancing over at the television that was showing a game no one was paying attention to.

Grabbing the remote, Jess changed it to the news. “Okay?”

“Wait for it.” Mara put another hundred on the bar.

Waiting for it encompassed ten minutes and three more glasses of scotch.

“Horrible, isn’t it?” Mara asked, getting Jess’ attention from serving another customer. 

Jess looked at the screen and it was talking about the man who had murdered his wife and daughter and fled. Authorities were still looking for him. “Yeah, what kind of person does that?”

“One who lacks empathy,” Mara replied succinctly. “But he didn’t do it.”

“He didn’t?” Jess turned back to the news, they were showing a family photo from someone’s Facebook page. The husband was tall, his arms wrapped around his wife who held their girl, probably three years old at the time. They looked… stupidly happy.

“The man got too close to Rittenhouse,” Mara said quietly. “So they went in, had orders to kill the whole family, but he’s been to war too, he made it out, but he’ll never be the same again.”

The news cycled to the next story, but the image of the happy family lingered in her mind. “Rittenhouse must have had a reason.”

“Everyone has a reason, theirs being a fear of exposure.” Mara poured herself another drink from the bottle of scotch she effectively bought. “But instead of just taking out the man, they decided to take his entire family out with him. Their daughter was five years old.”

“Are you sure that was the orders?” Jess defended Rittenhouse, the people who raised her, who cared about her. “Maybe it was an unfortunate mistake? The wife and daughter caught in a crossfire?”

“The goal was to make it look like a murder-suicide to discredit the man,” Mara replied harshly. “That was their orders. I’m sure if you did a little digging, you’d find that to be true. But I’d be cautious, if I were you. This wasn’t the first time they’ve done something like this.”

“Rittenhouse does important and good work.” Jess leaned in, bracing against the bar. She wasn’t going to have this woman speak so badly about her friends… her family... “What happened to them is unfortunate, possibly a mistake, but that doesn’t negate all the good we have done.”

Mara tilted her head. “Just like Wyatt’s drinking, his taking more and more dangerous missions, and your continuously increasing yelling matches doesn’t negate anything?” 

“That’s different,” Jess barely got out. “He has his troubles, but he’s getting help now.”

“How long you think that’s going to last?” Mara asked her, not a touch of sarcasm in her voice. “Wyatt can’t acknowledge, nor accept, a lot of things. Has he even admitted to his survivor’s guilt yet?”

Jess looked away. “He’s a good man, he just needs time.”

“About three years worth,” Mara mumbled.

“What does that mean?”

“Nothing,” Mara sighed, sliding off the stool. “Did you look up what I asked you to?”

“Stanislav Petrov?” Jess couldn’t have forgotten if she tried. “Yeah, but I don’t see what he has to do with anything.”

“You will,” she said with a knowing smile. “Until then, ah, let’s see, 2015. This stuff with ISIS is just going to get worse. I’d stay away from Napal and Greece, but there’s always Cuba.”

Jess was already so over this. “Could you be any more random or obtuse?”

“Sure, 2016… Trump wins.” Mara walked away.

“Donald Trump?” Jess made a face. “Wins what?”

~~~

March 25th, 2018

“Well, that was interesting.”

Jess’ head snapped up at the words. Mara was now sitting at the bar, her hair out of its usual ponytail, framing and almost hiding her face. It had been a little over three years since last Jess saw her, and the time wore itself in the woman’s eyes.

“When did you get here?” Jess asked her.

“While you and Wyatt were chatting,” Mara sat another hundred on the bar, Jess reaching for the scotch. “I wasn’t sure if this part would play out the same, if he remembered or not, but I was prepared for either.”

“Beginning to think I should just turn you in,” Jess rolled her eyes as she poured a drink. “I’m not going to get any answers if you keep not making any sense.”

“This time, this time I promise, you’ll have answers soon.” Mara gave her a subdued smile and then drowned the scotch, Jess refilling it immediately. “In fact, Wyatt will be the one to give them to you.”

Jess paused as she re-screwed the cap on the bottle. “Wait, you actually know Wyatt?”

“Never met the man, technically.” She shrugged and then nursed the alcohol this time. “But this latest mission he’s been on since, oh, October 2016… it’s the key to everything.”

Ever since Wyatt took his latest assignment, things had gotten pretty bad, he was probably cheating on her, and his drinking was so much worse. Once, she told him he was just like his father. She didn’t see him for weeks after that. 

Screw Rittenhouse… this marriage had fallen apart long ago. 

“Salem, JFK, Robert Johnson, Grace Humiston, Reagan, Harriet Tubman.”

Jessica blinked. “I recognized most of those words.”

“Memorize them, in that order,” Mara told her. “And when you get to Tubman, I want you to think about Petrov. About how one choice, about how doing what feels right, can change the world.”

There was so much sadness in Mara’s eyes, but so much hope as well. The two emotions battled themselves out in front of Jess and she didn’t know what to make of it. This woman who knew impossible things… 

“Repeat them for me.”

“Salem, JFK, Johnson, Hutchinson—”

“Humiston.”

“Humiston, whatever, Reagan and Tubman.”

“Good.” Mara nodded and pulled out a slip of paper from her coat, laying it on the bar. “When you make your decision, I want you to call me.”

Jess picked up the paper, a phone number written on it in neat handwriting, probably for a burner. “You said you were manipulating me.”

“I did.”

“How do you know I’ll make the decision you want me to?”

Mara stood from the stool, a weight and weariness on her shoulders. “Because, like Wyatt, you really are a good person who’s been affected by outside influences since childhood… and you didn’t ask for any of this.”

“Rittenhouse is my family.”

“Wyatt’s dad was his family, too.”

The woman walked away and Jess was left holding the piece of paper and a heavy feeling in her heart.

And later that night, when Jessica discovered that time travel was indeed real, and she had apparently died in another timeline… everything made sense now, just as Mara said it would. Mara must also be a time traveler, but one from the farther future because she wouldn’t be able to travel on her own timeline otherwise. 

The three others had just returned from Salem, the first word on the list. 

Jessica was unsettled by the realization that Mara wanted her to learn about Petrov because… because maybe Jessica was now Petrov.

~~~

John F. Kennedy

Robert Johnson

Grace Humiston

Ronald Reagan

Harriet Tubman

~~~

December 18th, 2018

Wyatt was becoming a problem. Jess had been able to defer his suspicions, but more and more it became harder to keep her involvement with Rittenhouse a secret. 

Her orders hadn’t given her a timeframe. Gather intel, take them out if she could. It would be difficult, what with Wyatt and Flynn being highly trained soldiers, and everyone randomly wandering around the bunker. She had thought out the logistics of it, even realized that she could do one better.

Grab either Jiya or Rufus and just steal the Lifeboat. Rittenhouse would love that… and she wouldn’t have to kill Wyatt.

Wyatt… Wyatt had changed, had gotten better. She could see the man she fell in love with there, just below the surface, trying to get out. Maybe… maybe if he got him away from all of this, got them both away, she could get her Wyatt back. 

But his heart had moved on and no amount of distance was going to change that.

It hurt.

So… steal the Lifeboat, give it to Rittenhouse so the Time Team can no longer follow them into the past. Rittenhouse wins. Good plan.

That was always the plan…

Jessica stopped dead as she was getting ready to sneak out of their room. 

Holy shit, that was what Mara had been telling her all along.

“Jess?” Wyatt said groggily as he woke up.

“Rittenhouse…” she let the word drift in the air.

That startled Wyatt into further alertness. “Rittenhouse? Did the alarm sound?”

Jessica started to laugh to keep from crying. “You… it’s always been about you. It’s never been about me.”

“Jess?” Wyatt stood up and walked over to her. “If this is about Lucy—”

“Oh, shut up, and stop kidding yourself.” Jess shook her head and pulled away. “They never cared about me… only about what I could do.”

“They… what?”

“Rittenhouse!” Now… now Jessica was angry. “They saved my brother to buy my loyalty, but they didn’t want _me_ , they only wanted a wrench to throw into the machine. Otherwise… they didn’t care if I got back in the car or not.”

Wyatt stared at her, processing this information, she could see him trying to fight the truth. “Jessica… it’s… you are really Rittenhouse?”

“All my damn life,” she answered bitterly. “I was a good little soldier, too, followed my orders, because I thought they were my family, but I was just another tool to them.” 

“We’re your family, Jess.” Wyatt took her by the hands but he was trembling. “We can make this right.”

Jess stared past him, everything so damn crystal clear now that the intensity of it seared her very soul. She was being used, all her decisions made for her as she dutifully followed orders.

“Petrov…” she whispered.

“What?”

“She never lied to me…” Jess laughed.

“Who, Petrov?” Wyatt was very much confused, but of course he would be. 

“Doesn’t matter now, I’ve made my choice. _Mine._ ”

Wyatt frowned, but then moved to grab his socks and shoes. “We need to talk to Agent Christopher. Explain to her the situation.”

That snapped Jess out of her melancholy. “She’ll arrest me.”

“No, no she won’t,” Wyatt assured her. “I’ll talk to her. If you know where Emma and Carol are holed up, then we can end this.”

“Right… make myself useful,” the words were acid on her tongue. “Because I’m only here because I’m useful…”

Wyatt never saw the punch coming. She had always kept it a secret that she had combat training. Rittenhouse wanted her to be able to fight if it came to that. They wanted a weapon that could protect itself, a rust-resistant coating on their wrench as it were.

Grabbing his gun, Jess bolted from the room as soon as Wyatt was laid out. She got to the door which had often been left unlocked now because it was obvious no one, not even Flynn, was going anywhere. She closed it behind her just in time to see Wyatt come out of their room and rush down the hall towards her. She jammed the door so he couldn’t follow.

There were agents up top, but they shouldn’t be a problem to get around. The car she steals will have to be gotten rid of immediately once she reaches town, otherwise GPS tracking would tag her. Then she needed to get a burner phone.

Jessica made all these plans as she heard Wyatt pounding on the door below, shouting her name.

~~~

December 19th, 2018

The diner was quaint, which meant it was small with good angles to watch entry and egress from. Jess spotted Mara sitting in a booth, eating breakfast of blueberry pancakes. The woman acknowledged her with a glance.

Jess slid into the booth, still tense and worried about being followed.

“Pancakes?” Mara asked, then gestured to the waitress.

“Not hungry,” Jess told her, but gratefully took a cup of coffee the waitress offered. “So… what happens next?”

“I have no idea.” Mara didn’t even pause in her eating, popping a piece of syrup drenched pancake in her mouth. 

“You’re from the future, though, right?”

“Supposed to be, yeah.” Mara shrugged, cutting another piece off. “Kinda just erased myself, but it was worth it.”

“Erased yourself?” Jess had heard talk about Amy Preston and knew that it was possible, but why do it intentionally to oneself?

“Happens.” Mara took a sip of orange juice. “The point is… the board has been reset. It’s a whole new game.”

“Amaranthe,” Jessica was so tired, “please, for once, just explain it to me, clearly? I think I deserve that much.”

Mara put her fork down, licking her lips and forming her words. “In my timeline, you followed orders, you stole the Lifeboat.”

“So this was about keeping Rittenhouse from winning?” It wasn’t a surprise.

“No, it’s about resetting the board,” Mara got frustrated, as if waring with herself about how much to say. “You see, you stealing the Lifeboat directly causes the deaths of… several people, including yourself, after a fashion. And _that_ leads the Team into thinking they defeated Rittenhouse, but they only stop Emma.”

Jess shook her head. “Rittenhouse is so much bigger than Emma, or Carol.”

“Exactly,” Mara nearly slammed her hand on the table. “We both know that Rittenhouse’s roots run deep. That Cahill is still in prison only because he hasn’t given the order yet to get him out. So, when the whole blowup happens, the Council decides to stand back and let the Team _think_ they’ve won.”

“They won a battle, but lost the war?” 

“The war is still raging,” that infinite sadness crept back into Mara’s voice. “Rittenhouse is able to build another time machine from documents left by Emma. They try to go back and make changes, but before that, they target the Team and anyone who knows about time travel. But they aren’t able to get everyone. The last ten years of my life has been nothing but chasing after Rittenhouse, trying to protect the timeline, even as the world goes to shit.”

Jess was beginning to understand. “So, by me not stealing the Lifeboat and triggering this faux-ending, the Team keeps fighting Rittenhouse.”

“Yes, and hopefully they will see just how far that rabbit hole goes.”

“Rittenhouse could still win.” Jessica didn’t know how she wanted to feel about that.

“Possibly,” Mara admitted. “Hell, things could end up even worse. Or maybe, just maybe, this time everyone does get their happy ending.”

“Except you,” Jess pointed out softly, everything clicking into place. “You erased yourself for a roll of the dice.”

“Yeah, well,” Mara shrugged and went back to her pancakes. “Idiotic, self-sacrificial tendencies seem to be a Thompkins’ family trait.”

Jess sighed and leaned back into the booth. “So… what do I do now?”

“Whatever you damn please. You’re making your own decisions now.” Mara took another swig of orange juice. “You could go to Rittenhouse, I’m sure you could make a convincing enough lie as to what happened. You’re still useful to them. You could go back to Wyatt. He loves you, but he’s not _in_ love with you anymore, but you can still use that to secure yourself immunity. Or, and this is my favorite, go find a beach somewhere and stop giving two shits about anything.”

“Is that your plan?” Jess frowned. “You may have reset the board but there is so much that you know. You could end this yourself.”

“Maybe, maybe not.” She shrugged again. “Butterfly effect and all that, I have no idea how much of my intel is still good after what just happened.”

“Still—” 

“I am not god,” Mara said clearly. “I didn’t just decide to come back and do this. _We_ made the decision. Us, the future. It was _our_ decision to make. I’m done now. I’m not taking away anyone else’s free will just because I think I know better.”

Jess could tell the woman had made up her mind and there was no changing it. Now all that was left to decide was what to do herself. Rittenhouse, Wyatt, or a beach. All three sounded equally appealing and empty. Her whole life was a lie… was it too late to start over?

“What if…” she started to say. “What if I was always meant to die?”

“Hhmm?”

“I died in the original timeline. I died in your timeline.” The hard truth pulled her down. “What if I was never supposed to live?”

“You’re talking about fate?”

“Yeah, I guess.”

Mara sat her knife and fork down and took a breath. “I’ve been a lot of places, met a lot of people, been the embodiment of fate, and you know what I learned? Fate doesn’t work that way.”

“What do you mean?”

“God, the universe, whatever, all it does is put people and opportunities in our path. You decide what you want to do with them.” Mare pointed her finger at Jessica. “You.” Mara placed her hand on her own chest. “Person.” She pointed out the window of the diner. “Opportunities.” She then gestured to her plate of food. “Pancakes.”

/end

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading. <3  
> Just one of a few thoughts I had of ways to fix the movie snafu.


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